MEI Members DB Schenker are providing biweekly COVID-19 customer advisory updates, including; up to date guidance, advice and orientation over all business areas and geographical locations.
Executive Summary
Ocean Freight
- Continued strong market demand on capacity remains the driving factor for exports ex Asia Pacific.
- This does cause rates to increase dramatically ex Asia, more mildly from other regions. Rates are expected to move up further during the 2nd half of December as well as during January 2021. Provision of equipment in Asia remains the biggest operational hurdle in the weeks to come, despite new buildings for a number of carriers and ongoing repositioning activities.
- Carriers apply strict yield management; this also impacts year-round 2021 contracts significantly.
- Global schedule reliability down to 52%.
- Congestions in several place in the world on the rise.
Air Freight
- Market demand is continuously outperforming capacity supply leading to a very tight capacity situation especially out of APAC, while demand recently also further increased on many trades from North America as well as Europe.
- Ground Handling situation remains critical across all key economies and countries due to increasing impact of COVID-19 cases and situation in the major countries with increasing regulations.
- Market situation is expected to remain similar for Q1-2021 with initial short-term impacts of a potential COVID-19 vaccine distribution.
Land Transport
- Restrictions to contain the COVID-19 pandemic are re-established in several European countries, directly or indirectly affecting transportation.
- In case of disruptions, DB Schenker follows their pre-defined contingency plans to ensure flows of cargo, they are adapting their transport service offerings daily to the needs of their customers.
- Some receivers continue to have limited operations. All shippers may check the delivery possibility with the consignee to avoid cost for storage or return shipments.
Contract Logistics
- DB Schenkers operations and customer services remain stable.
- They continue to prioritise the protection of their staff and keeping their customers’ businesses running.
- BCP‘s are in place and monitored around the world.
- They are supporting with storage and handling of PPE and offer short-term warehousing where idle space is available.
To access the full report and find out more information about DB Schenkers operations please visit their website using the link here
